While listening to Graham’s newest book, America Before, I was struck by the section covering the “eye (portal) in palm” motif found on a hopewell era disc.
I was particularly interested in the connection/parallels to the possible theology that inspired the disc, which features the ubiquitous “eye in hand” surrounded by two horned rattlesnakes bound together to form a continuous circle around the hand. The connections he made between this iconography and the Egyptian beliefs around death as expressed in the collective funerary texts.
Graham correctly pointed out that there is not only a huge geographic disparity between high Egyptian culture and the Hopewellian culture but also a large gap in time between when these two cultures flourished.
While the separation of these cultures by both time and geography makes it highly unlikely there is any direct connection between the two, there is a possible connection with the Adena culture of the Ohio river valley that may provide a possible bridge between the two that would at least account for the disparity in time between the two cultures.
While the hopewell eye in hand motif disc is by far the most well known example of the use of this iconography in North America, it is by no means the first example of its use in the region. The Gaitskill clay tablet found in Kentucky in the 1920’s shows a similar eye in palm motif, albeit more stylized and somewhat hidden within the images of waterfowl also featured on the tablet. The tablet, which dates back to the Adena culture/complex of the early woodland period (circa 500 BC - 200 AD) shows two sets of mirror images of ducks/geese.
What is particularly interesting relative to the hopewell disc is the way in which the birds’ wings are also very clearly modeled after the human hand, with a well defined thumb and 4 fingers. The “palm” of the hand (which also makes up the body of the goose) features an outer ring with a smaller circle in its center. While it was originally interpreted by anthropologists to be a stylized eye, likely representing the soul or body spirit, I believe Graham’s interpretation that this actually represents a sky portal (often conflated with “eye” iconography) is also plausible.
While the geographic distance between the Adena and Egyptian cultures still make any direct connection a dubious proposition, They did exist at roughly the same time, making it at least theoretically possible that the two cultures may have come into direct or indirect contact through long distance trade and the movement of memes or cultural beliefs that are often transmitted along with the exchange of physical items.
Similar eye/portal motifs are found throughout the gaitskill Adena tablet, and may speak to the belief in multiple souls shared by several Native American cultures and Egyptian culture. Equally compelling, are the strikingly similar glyphs and pictographs that are evident in both Adena iconography and contemporary Turkish cultures.
Researchers who have compared the iconography of both the archaic Turkish culture of 1200-500 BC and the Adena culture 500 BC-200 AD state that the similarities between the images are so strikingly alike in both design and meaning that the possibility that it is mere coincidence is unlikely. The same researchers go on to offer several possibilities for the connection, all of which involve direct contact either through the exchange of goods over interconnected long distance trade networks (materials originating as far away as the amazon have been found in Adena sites, confirming that some amount of long distance trade was taking place at the time).
Here is a picture of the gaitskill tablet showing the Adena eye in palm motif:
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There is no doubt that the story of human history is far more complicated and interconnected than has been asserted by modern day archeologists and I firmly believe that as more and more evidence accumulates- they will have no choice but to acknowledge that, at a minimum, we really have no clue what was going on in human prehistory. Humans have had the one tool necessary to traverse oceans, transmit ideas, and forge worldwide connections for at least 130,000 years- what tool was this? Anatomically modern brains, every bit as capable as our own. Think of all that humanity has accomplished in the last 50 years, 100 years, 2,000 years, and now try to imagine what could have been accomplished over the span of the 130,000 years humans have been every bit as intelligent and curious as we are today. Given that the likely sites for any advanced civilizations of prehistory would have been close to shorelines that are now completely submerged due to sea level rise, it is unlikely we’ll discover direct evidence of any such civilizations- but it is clear that they left their fingerprints in the strikingly similar ideas and memes found throughout the world and persist to this very day.
Maybe some day in the not to distant future, technologies like lidar will allow us to find physical proof of these advanced civilizations but until then we can still work to reveal the shared beliefs and ideas that would have been the hallmarks of such civilizations. Always remember “absence of evidence is not evidence of absence” and the connections are there for anyone willing to see them!
I was particularly interested in the connection/parallels to the possible theology that inspired the disc, which features the ubiquitous “eye in hand” surrounded by two horned rattlesnakes bound together to form a continuous circle around the hand. The connections he made between this iconography and the Egyptian beliefs around death as expressed in the collective funerary texts.
Graham correctly pointed out that there is not only a huge geographic disparity between high Egyptian culture and the Hopewellian culture but also a large gap in time between when these two cultures flourished.
While the separation of these cultures by both time and geography makes it highly unlikely there is any direct connection between the two, there is a possible connection with the Adena culture of the Ohio river valley that may provide a possible bridge between the two that would at least account for the disparity in time between the two cultures.
While the hopewell eye in hand motif disc is by far the most well known example of the use of this iconography in North America, it is by no means the first example of its use in the region. The Gaitskill clay tablet found in Kentucky in the 1920’s shows a similar eye in palm motif, albeit more stylized and somewhat hidden within the images of waterfowl also featured on the tablet. The tablet, which dates back to the Adena culture/complex of the early woodland period (circa 500 BC - 200 AD) shows two sets of mirror images of ducks/geese.
What is particularly interesting relative to the hopewell disc is the way in which the birds’ wings are also very clearly modeled after the human hand, with a well defined thumb and 4 fingers. The “palm” of the hand (which also makes up the body of the goose) features an outer ring with a smaller circle in its center. While it was originally interpreted by anthropologists to be a stylized eye, likely representing the soul or body spirit, I believe Graham’s interpretation that this actually represents a sky portal (often conflated with “eye” iconography) is also plausible.
While the geographic distance between the Adena and Egyptian cultures still make any direct connection a dubious proposition, They did exist at roughly the same time, making it at least theoretically possible that the two cultures may have come into direct or indirect contact through long distance trade and the movement of memes or cultural beliefs that are often transmitted along with the exchange of physical items.
Similar eye/portal motifs are found throughout the gaitskill Adena tablet, and may speak to the belief in multiple souls shared by several Native American cultures and Egyptian culture. Equally compelling, are the strikingly similar glyphs and pictographs that are evident in both Adena iconography and contemporary Turkish cultures.
Researchers who have compared the iconography of both the archaic Turkish culture of 1200-500 BC and the Adena culture 500 BC-200 AD state that the similarities between the images are so strikingly alike in both design and meaning that the possibility that it is mere coincidence is unlikely. The same researchers go on to offer several possibilities for the connection, all of which involve direct contact either through the exchange of goods over interconnected long distance trade networks (materials originating as far away as the amazon have been found in Adena sites, confirming that some amount of long distance trade was taking place at the time).
Here is a picture of the gaitskill tablet showing the Adena eye in palm motif:
There is no doubt that the story of human history is far more complicated and interconnected than has been asserted by modern day archeologists and I firmly believe that as more and more evidence accumulates- they will have no choice but to acknowledge that, at a minimum, we really have no clue what was going on in human prehistory. Humans have had the one tool necessary to traverse oceans, transmit ideas, and forge worldwide connections for at least 130,000 years- what tool was this? Anatomically modern brains, every bit as capable as our own. Think of all that humanity has accomplished in the last 50 years, 100 years, 2,000 years, and now try to imagine what could have been accomplished over the span of the 130,000 years humans have been every bit as intelligent and curious as we are today. Given that the likely sites for any advanced civilizations of prehistory would have been close to shorelines that are now completely submerged due to sea level rise, it is unlikely we’ll discover direct evidence of any such civilizations- but it is clear that they left their fingerprints in the strikingly similar ideas and memes found throughout the world and persist to this very day.
Maybe some day in the not to distant future, technologies like lidar will allow us to find physical proof of these advanced civilizations but until then we can still work to reveal the shared beliefs and ideas that would have been the hallmarks of such civilizations. Always remember “absence of evidence is not evidence of absence” and the connections are there for anyone willing to see them!